French lap up novel on Jawaharlal Nehru-Edwina Mountbatten romance

Catherine Clement's romantic novel about Jawaharlal Nehru and Edwina Mount-batten, Pour L'Amour de L'Inde, has the French sighing.

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December 31, 1993

ISSUE DATE: December 31, 1993

UPDATED: July 22, 2013 13:50 IST

Catherine Clement: Nehru-Edwina link

The French got the connection, but much later. Catherine Clement's romantic novel about Jawaharlal Nehru and Edwina Mountbatten, Pour L'Amour de L'Inde, has the French sighing: over 1,30,000 copies were snapped up in just two months.

The did-they-did-they-not question has hung over this subcontinent for decades. But for the French, it was a "scoop, a surprise", says Clement, adding that only 10 per cent of her love story is "invented".

Research during her years as the wife of the French envoy to New Delhi and visits since then have provided the rest of her material.

If there is a dreamy quality about the bestseller, it is because of Clement's nocturnal encounters with the dramatis personae: "Sarojini Naidu, Jawaharlal Nehru, Edwina and Mahatma Gandhi all talked to me in my dreams."

Well, if dreams are the food of bestsellers, then dream on....

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